


The View After The Apocalypse

by ToBetterOurselves



Category: Thor (Movies)
Genre: Calling this Thorki might be a stretch, Gen, Post-Thor: Ragnarok (2017)
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-04-08
Updated: 2018-04-08
Packaged: 2019-04-20 04:30:17
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,291
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14253069
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ToBetterOurselves/pseuds/ToBetterOurselves
Summary: After Ragnarok, Heimdall has a new post, yet still he watches. He observes the people of Asgard on their ship, and reflects on the two royal sons.





	The View After The Apocalypse

**Author's Note:**

> I really loved the ending to Thor: Ragnarok, and I’m really worried that Infinity War is going to scrub it all away, so I felt like lingering a bit on their first night on the journey.

From his post at the helm of the Statesman, Heimdall watches. 

He knows it is futile, but his heart is feeling willful tonight, and so his gaze is drawn to home. 

Asgard is unrecognizable at first glance. When Heimdall focuses, he can still recognize some of the towers from the exterior of the city, not yet fully collapsed under the fire. Surtur, raging and mindless, stokes the fires ceaselessly. Hela is nowhere to be seen, but it’s hard to imagine anywhere she could hide in this all-consuming fire. 

Heimdall turns his eyes to their destination. Midgard looks the same as always - watery, isolated, and consumed with its own factional divisions. Even Thor’s friends, the supposed heroes of the land, appear to be fighting one another.

Still, they are months away from Midgard, and right now his people are crowded onto an alien ship, terrified and heartsick. Heimdall’s gaze circles the ship, checking in on his people and their new companions. 

Brunnhilde, the last of the Valkyries, sleeps in a chair in a garish white and purple room. The lights are still on at full brightness. The bed is untouched. Propped against her chair is her sword, sheathed, but near at hand. Multiple empty bottles surround her. 

The Hulk has retreated, it would seem, as Bruce Banner now sits cross-legged on the large bed they had given to the green giant. If Banner is attempting to meditate, he is not doing a very good job, as he keeps opening his eyes to stare out the window at the stars flying by. 

The healers of Asgard are beginning to sleep in shifts. There’s still a seemingly unlimited amount of work to be done, but everyone is slowly coming down from full panic mode. They have set up triage stations. The severely wounded have been stabilized or made comfortable. The less severely wounded have been told where to wait or when to come back.

Someone found a cabinet of food, and they have set up a table of snacks for the children. By silent mutual agreement, not one adult eats a single bite. Tomorrow, they will make a plan to ration food. Tonight, the children will go to bed with stomachs filled with cookies and crackers. 

Thor and Loki, no longer two princes, but a king and a prince, sit side-by-side on the bed. Both stare in front of them, unsleeping but silent. They pass a bottle of brown liquid back and forth. After a particularly large swig, Loki winces and makes a noise of disgust. Thor laughs in one big exhale - humorless, but in agreement. They both fall silent again, just breathing, drinking, and thinking. 

A group of teenagers slip their parents’ rooms and gather in the hall to sit together. Some look heartbreakingly young, crying like much smaller children. Others play at adulthood, pledging vengeance on Hela and Surtur, boasting of how they will return to Asgard someday to take their home back. If they could see Asgard now, they wouldn’t want it back. 

Korg the Kronan slumbers on a bed in one the Sakaarans’ rooms. Miek is curled up in a cat-like ball on top of Korg’s chest. Despite Korg’s size, two other former gladiators sleep on the bed. More lie on the floor, a couple share a couch. 

Heimdall’s eyes circle the ship, watching the people of Asgard sleeping in their crowded rooms. He tries to catalogue their names in his head, but he finds he doesn’t know many of them. The warriors of Asgard had all perished in the streets - their whole army destroyed singlehandedly by the goddess of death.

And many more had been buried in the sea below the bifrost. Asgardians had never been shy to lift a weapon, and all who had been able to fight had been drawn to the front of the final battle. 

Heimdall turns back to the Valkyrie. Brunnhilde is still asleep and snoring, now somehow twisted upside down in her chair. Her drinking is troubling - he will have to watch her habits.

Banner is now asleep too, tucked neatly under the blankets with the lights off, only the ambient light from the window illuminating his room. 

Loki has slumped down and fallen asleep, still half-clothed in armor. Thor still sits next to him, his lone eye staring at the wall. One of Thor’s hands holds the bottle of liquor. The other plays with the loose curls of Loki’s black hair, splayed out on the pillow. 

Heimdall’s eyes linger on their new king. It is still a happy surprise to look on Thor and see this grown man, now wise as well as strong. 

Had anyone asked him years ago at Thor’s first failed coronation, Heimdall would have agreed with Loki that Thor was not ready to be king. Thor was too eager for battle, and painfully ignorant thanks to a life as a prince of a wealthy realm.

Heimdall was desperately thankful to see that Thor had taken all the pain and loss of the past years and become the leader their people needed - concerned with his people above all else. 

It hardly would have been a surprise if Thor had grown into a selfish king, given the family that had come before him. 

Odin had plenty of wisdom and experience, but he had been power-hungry and greedy, and occasionally cruel even to those whom he loved. Hela had taken easily to hate before she could even carry a dagger, and ended her life as a being of pure viciousness. 

Loki had almost succeeded as king, but had ultimately failed. And having been banished by Loki-as-Odin, Heimdall was not above a smug satisfaction that Loki had failed for that very reason - for pushing away everyone he could have relied on.

Loki had not been able to fully use his own intelligence and strength, swinging wildly between depressive periods of inaction - hiding in the palace and letting the nine realms fall into disrepair. Then Loki would be overcome with manic energy - casting spell after spell to protect the nine realms, arranging treaties, writing plays, and twice actually leading hunts as Odin used to, even if Loki’s hunts were more like picnics.

But Loki’s magic had gradually become weaker as he spent it to maintain the Odin illusion, and eventually Heimdall had been able to watch him when he was alone. The Loki he saw behind closed doors was nothing like what he presented to the public. Loki had been desperately lonely and sickened by self-hatred and anger, some of it righteous, all of it toxic.

Heimdall looked back to the brothers now, sharing a room on the ship. 

Thor was now holding Loki’s hair in both his hands, rubbing it between the pads of his fingers. Thor pulled a small lock of hair to him, and despite his large fingers, he still managed to plait Loki’s hair into a tight braid. Thor fastened the braid on both ends, then used a dagger from Loki’s boot to slice the braid close to the scalp. 

Thor stood, removing his armor and eyepatch. He went to stand in front of the mirror, and wrapped the braid around his right wrist, and after a few attempts, managed to get it fastened with one hand.

Thor turned off the lights and lay back into the bed with Loki, who had half woken up and pulled off his armor before crawling under the covers. Thor wrapped his arm around Loki, who smiled at the sight of his hair on Thor’s arm. Eventually, the king and the prince drifted off to sleep. 

Thor looked calm, and Loki looked happy. And despite all the things Heimdall had seen in the past day, that sight was the most surprising of all.

**Author's Note:**

> I’m on tumblr! [@tobetterourselves](https://www.tumblr.com/blog/tobetterourselves)


End file.
